(digital chirpinbg) (mysterious music) (digital chirpinbg) - [Narrator] Tonight on Unidentified. - [Reporter] The Pentagon has confirmed the existence of the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program that studied UFOs and they released video. - [Pilot] There's a whole fleet of them, my gosh.
- [Narrator] For eight years, Lou Elizando ran a secret UFO investigation for the US military, but in 2017, he quit in protest. - I put my entire future on the line because I believe in what I believe in. - [Narrator] Now he's joined an elite group of former government insiders.
Their mission, reveal what they say is the truth about UFOs. - [Chris] US airspace is being violated by vehicles of unknown origin with advanced capabilities. - [Man] It's rotating.
- [Narrator] The investigation has uncovered two astonishing encounters between UFOs and US navy carrier strike groups years apart. - We were all clamoring to get on the radio. Do you see in the water, what the, is that?
- If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, I don't know if I would have believed it either. - [Narrator] In each case, the navy carriers were nuclear-powered. - Is that why these things might be interested in carrier groups?
- [Narrator] For decades, UFOs have allegedly been hovering near nuclear assets in the American heartland. - It shot straight up in the air and was gone in a second. - [Narrator] And overseas.
- The beams went down into the weapon storage area, and I'm thinking oh my god. - [Narrator] Is there a connection between the appearance of these unidentified craft and America's most powerful weapons? (tense music) - President Bill Clinton wanted to know about UFOs.
Ronald Reagan had an interest in UFOs. We know that Jimmy Carter, as a candidate, made a promise, "If I'm elected, I'm going to find out what's going on with UFOs. " and then he never said another word about them.
Even Presidents find out that they don't have the power to automatically release all this information. - [Luis] Today I'm gonna be meeting a former sheriff of a small town here in North Dakota. He had an interesting encounter some time ago.
What makes this particularly interesting I think this incident is that A, he's a law enforcement officer, B, he's former military, and C, there were other eyewitnesses. I don't want to speculate, but there seems to be a lot of sightings of something. What that something is, we don't know.
At one time, this area had more nuclear silos than just about anywhere else in the United States. (car beeps) (knocking) - Oh hello. - How are you, sir?
- Good, how are you doing? - Pleasure to meet you. - Pleasure to meet you, Lou.
Come on in. - All right. - [Narrator] Larry Gessner served for 11 years as a weapons specialist at nearby Minot Air Force Base.
He was responsible for loading nuclear weapons on bombers, and after retiring from the Air Force, he was sheriff of Sheridan County. - I have been waiting 15 years before I get to tell this event. - [Narrator] This is the first time he's talking publicly about his UFO encounter.
- [Lou] So why don't you show me where it all happened? - Okay well, we've got this house here which was the neighbor's house, and the driveway there. - So this is the lot, this is where your house stood.
- Yup. - [Narrator] One night in 2003, he and another eyewitness saw something they couldn't explain. - If you look over there, that would have been right where it came over.
- Okay, 144 degrees. So we're looking at almost due southeast, okay, copy. - The thing that stood out the most to me was that instead of a horizontal plane for lights, you know, which you would see on an aircraft, they were vertical.
- Just like this? - Yeah. And so I said "I don't know any craft," it was confusing, I kept saying to myself this isn't making any sense.
As it got closer, the lights became more prominent, and we could discern that there was larger lights along the front edge that were rounder, you know, the bigger lights and then there were smaller lights on the outside edge. As it got to this point here, now all of a sudden I realize there's windows. There was a thickness to the wall of the craft.
It got right over top and that's when I said, you know, about up in here, now I can see the bottom of this thing, and it's a diamond shape. It came to a stop, the lights went out, and then this white glow showed up on the back of the craft and it shot straight up in the air and was gone in a second. - You know what looks diamond to me, the F-117.
That's kind of diamond shaped. Maybe you were witnessing that. - No, the size of this craft, it was probably close to 200 feet in the air, and 100 feet wide.
- So this is sizably different. (geese honking) Okay, so here's my close-up. You're here, right?
- Correct. - What you're saying is that it was heading in the opposite direction, which is in fact certainly within the trajectory here where you saw it and where it ended up, and then shot up. It is, in fact, toward Minot.
- [Narrator] Minot Air Force Base lies 75 miles to the northwest. Since the beginning of the Cold War, Minot has been one of the most weaponized places on Earth. It's America's only base that can launch both nuclear missiles and nuclear-armed long range bombers.
- There are a lot of nuclear sites between where you are and Minot. I mean, I'm counting here and there's probably 30 or 40, I've got three maps. Between here and here, there's a hell of a lot of stuff here, nuclear.
- [Narrator] This isn't the first time Elizando's investigation has found a link between UFOs and US nuclear assets. - We seem to see these things around US nuclear equities. Nuclear power, nuclear weapons, and nuclear technology.
There definitely seems to be some sort of correlation, and if I see something that potentially has the ability to either threaten or disable our strategic nuclear capability, I have to consider that a threat. - [George] The progress that's been made in the last year is incredible, but there are still big secrets being kept. If that can be leaked out or released, even if it's a dribble, it changes everything.
- [Narrator] Next, Elizando stops in Las Vegas. He is here to meet with investigative journalist George Knapp. Knapp has uncovered documents that may reveal a connection between UFO sightings and America's atomic arsenal.
- If anybody is gonna be able to shed some light and help me better understand that relationship, I think it's you. - [Narrator] Over the years, Knapp has filed Freedom of Information requests with the departments of Defense and Energy. - [George] This is from 1985.
- [Narrator] And interviewed scores of government eyewitnesses. - These go way back. - [Lou] And these are reports of reported incidents.
- UFO incidents, this is from way back in 1948, that's over Los Alamos. Another unknown object in New Mexico. That's during the Manhattan Project.
(tense music) - [Narrator] During the 1950s, the Air Force detonated more than 100 atomic bombs in above ground tests in the Nevada desert. - I had more than a dozen people who had worked out there at the test site during the height of the above ground testing period who said UFOs were commonplace. There were employees assigned to monitor UFO activity in connection with the tests.
Sometimes they'd appear before the tests, oftentimes they'd appear after it, and once in a while, they would appear during these tests. (bomb explodes) All of the nuclear facilities, Los Alamos, Livermoore, Sandia, Savannah River, all had UFO incidents. (bomb explodes) This says if it's firmly indicated, there is no domestic explanation.
The objects are a threat and warrant more active efforts at identification and interception. - Doesn't that sound familiar? - All copies were supposed to be destroyed.
- [Man] Three, two, one. - [Narrator] In 1959, the US introduced a deadly new addition to its nuclear arsenal, the ICBM, or intercontinental ballistic missile. These nuclear-tipped missiles could strike targets more than 3,500 miles away.
According to Knapp, UFOs now began to be seen at the new ICBM launch sites across the Midwest. - What would be an example of one of the more compelling incidents? - In Minot Air Force Base, UFOs appear over these missiles.
Something enables the missile and it's ready to go. - [Narrator] In 1966, military personnel say a UFO appeared over Minot Air Force Base, 75 miles from Larry Gessner's sighting. They claim one of Minot's nuclear missiles allegedly activated as a UFO hovered above, then deactivated when it disappeared.
A year later, a similar incident allegedly happened at Malmstrom Air Force Base in Montana. Military personnel there say a glowing red oval-shaped object hovered over its missile silos, and all 10 of the base's nuclear missiles were disabled. - They don't know what's causing it, they don't know how to stop it.
That puts it all on the line. That tells you how serious this matter is. - [Narrator] Over the next two decades, multiple US nuclear launch sites would report alarming UFO incidents, but no one can explain why.
- Just think about this synopsis. At the facilities where we were first designing and building nuclear weapons, there were UFOs. At the facilities where we were testing the weapons, there were UFOs.
At the bases where we deployed those weapons, on the ships, the nuclear submarines, all those places, all the people working there have seen these things, are they all crazy? Because if they are, they shouldn't have their hands on nuclear weapons. - Agreed, either mass delusion or they're all right, but either way, we need to look into this.
- Yeah. (dramatic music) - The colonel of an American Air Force base and a lot of his airmen claim that something from outside the Earth's atmosphere landed at their air force base. They inspected it, they photographed it, they took tests on the ground where it had been, and found radioactive traces.
There are only two explanations for what happened that night. One explanation is that it actually happened as Colonel Halt reported. The other is that Colonel Halt and all his men were hallucinating.
(doorbell rings) Surely to any sensible person, either of those explanations is of the utmost defense interest. This should be the subject of rigorous scientific investigation, and not the subject of rubbishing by tabloid newspapers. - I couldn't agree more.
- [Narrator] Lou Elizando is in Virginia to continue investigating the link between UFO sightings and America's nuclear arsenal. - Can we go back one more slide too to the nuclear power plant? - Sure.
- So this is the nuclear power plant, and this facility was there while you were there? - Oh yes, it was there before I was there even. - [Narrator] Elizando's reexamining one of the most notorious UFO incidents in history.
In 1980, Lieutenant Colonel Charles Halt was second in command of America's largest air base in Europe, RAF Bentwaters, 100 miles northeast of London. Cold War tensions were high, and the base was a pivotal part of NATO's defenses. - RAF Bentwaters is the largest tactical fighter wing in the free world.
We had A-10s, the mission of the base was if the Eastern Bloc countries came into Germany, the A-10s would go kill tanks and carry the war to the enemy heartland. - [Narrator] Bentwaters often housed advanced test aircraft and experimental weapons. - It was a stressful time.
- [Narrator] But hidden deep under the base was one of the Cold War's most guarded secrets, 25 fortified bunkers filled with lightweight but highly powerful nuclear bombs, always at the ready to repel a Soviet invasion of the NATO bloc. This information wasn't made public for decades. As deputy commander, Halt's top priority was protecting the base from terrorists and communists, not UFOs.
- Tell me what you experienced back in 1980. - [Charles] We were having our Christmas party. We just finished the main meal and were getting ready for dessert when the on duty police lieutenant came in white as a sheet and he said "we saw lights in the forest.
" There was something out there, we don't know what it was, so we came to get you. Oh my. The base commander said "go put this thing to rest.
" - [Narrator] Halt led a team into nearby Rendlesham Forest and began recording what he was experiencing on a small tape recorder. - [Narrator] Halt and his men began to see a series of lights flying above and then into the forest around them. - The object comes into the forest a bit, then it moves horizontally through the trees avoiding the trees, obviously under some type of intelligent control.
- [Narrator] Soon the lights were right on top of them, leaving Halt and his men paralyzed with fear. - The beam is not like an ordinary light, it doesn't radiate, it was like a laser beam, it was focused. It landed right, 10, 15 feet away from us at our feet.
I was literally in shock. - Could you tell from your perspective how high in the sky they were? - My guess is about three or 4,000 feet, but I can't tell for sure.
Meantime, we noticed two glowing white objects, very bright objects to the south in the sky. - [Narrator] Halt claims the craft then flew north toward the base. - We could hear the chatter on the radios that the beams went down into the weapon storage area, and I'm thinking oh my god.
- [Narrator] Halt feared the craft was targeting the base's secret nuclear storage bunkers. - It wasn't a comet, it wasn't a meteor, I mean, three of them moving in synchronization? They weren't coming down, they were moving in the sky, and I keep telling them where to look and they keep telling me nobody can see anything with the radar.
I'm thinking is this a warning, is this a weapon? Is this some kind of communication? I couldn't believe what was happening.
- [Narrator] The next day, Halt reported his experiences to his superiors. Their response mirrored a pattern that became familiar to Elizando when he ran America's secret UFO program. - I went into the office that morning, I think it was Sunday morning.
The wing commander drove up. They said "that was some light you had "last night, wasn't it? " I said "it sure was.
" I said "I made a small tape recording of some of it. " He said "what, let's hear it. " - He said "wow, let me have it.
" I thought there goes my career. He took the tape and of course I worried all week. Wednesday when he came back in the staff meeting, he said "I played the tape for the general and the staff, "and the general in his infinite wisdom "said happened off the base, it's a breach affair, "case closed.
" - [Lou] Wow. - [Narrator] Hoping to catch the attention of someone up the chain of command, Halt drafted a memo detailing the events in Rendlesham Forest. - I wrote the infamous memo in kind of cleaned it up a little bit, I didn't call it UFOs, I called it unexplained lights.
- [Narrator] When Halt's report leaked, it would make the Rendlesham incident worldwide news. - [Reporter] Witnesses claimed that the Rendlesham Forest was the landing site of an unidentified flying object. - [Narrator] And locals would come forward to bolster Halt's account that something strange had happened.
- The closer it got, the more I realized it was not an aircraft. - I blinked and it was gone. - [Narrator] But over the years, debunkers have claimed the incident was merely a hoax or something even more sinister, a secret American weapons test gone wrong.
- I did everything I could to stay in the background. I really didn't want the attention. It certainly wasn't career enhancing.
- It didn't help my career either. By the way, there's not a damn thing we can do about it. - Once you touch it, you got it.
- [Lou] Right, yeah. - You bought it. - Once you're involved in it, baby, you're involved in it, and there's no real way to back out of it.
(mysterious music) - [Luis] In the past, I can see why people didn't want to address it. How do you have a conversation about a threat that you don't know what it is and how it works and you can't do anything about it? When you have other concerns like nuclear war, that's why it's important that we talk to eyewitnesses, that's why with Rendlesham, we want to collect the eyewitness testimony, you want to pretty much collect anything and everything you can.
So John, you obviously had a very successful career. What I'd like to do is ask you a few questions about an experience you supposedly had. - [Narrator] Lou Elizando is meeting with an Air Force veteran who served under Lieutenant Colonel Charles Halt during the Rendlesham UFO event in 1980.
- The object comes into the forest then it moves horizontally through the trees, obviously under some type of intelligent control. - I won't ask you anything that requires a sensitive answer. If you can't answer it, just simply say "Lou, I prefer not to answer that.
" - Right. - [Narrator] John Burroughs was a military policeman on the RAF Bentwaters base in eastern England. Among his duties, protecting the base's secret arsenal of nuclear weapons.
- [Lou] To the best of your recollection, tell me what happened. - It was Christmas night, I came on duty at 2300. When I went down to the staging area, Halt was out in the forest.
- [Lou] Okay. - If you listen to the Halt tape, you'll hear my name on it. - [Narrator] While Lieutenant Colonel Halt and a team investigated reports of mysterious lights in the nearby forest, from the base, Sergeant Burroughs listened to the unfolding events on the radio.
- The beam is not like an ordinary light, it doesn't radiate, it was like a laser beam, it was focused. It landed right, 10, 15 feet away from us at our feet. - [Narrator] Later that night, another set of lights appeared.
This time, Burroughs and another military policeman, Sergeant Jim Penniston, were sent into Rendlesham Forest. - This orange light all of a sudden appeared in the distance, it started coming down. - [Lou] Are you in the forest?
- We're in a clearing area. I'm like, I'd like to get a closer look. The sergeant that was with me, he looked at me and he says "go for it.
" As we started moving towards it, it looked like it started moving towards us. - [Narrator] As they approach the light, Burroughs says it suddenly flew over him and his partner. - [John] Whatever it was, came over the top of me.
I phased away and was gone. - [Narrator] Burroughs says he has no memory of what happened next, but Sergeant Penniston told him he appeared to vanish into thin air. - So let me see if I've captured this correctly.
You just remember coming there then all of a sudden (claps) bam, gone, and then all of a sudden, he tells you that you were here and you basically disappeared. - And then I was back. We start walking back, and there's when it even gets stranger.
Neither one of us remember anything until the next day. - That's very interesting. And so what was Halt's reaction to all this?
- Don't really know, have no memory from that point until the next day. - Do you think there was some loss of time somewhere? - Well, I mean, that's where I try to be careful with this.
I don't understand. People say I was abducted, I was taken, all that, and maybe I was, I honestly do not know what happened. That's haunted me my whole life.
- [Narrator] Immediately after the incident, Burroughs says he started to experience health problems. - I had some eye issues, and then at one point, my gums turned white. - That's fascinating.
- When you were there at the base, did we already have nuclear capabilities in or around the area? - I'm not at liberty to comment on what the resources were, but I'm not at liberty really to comment on any base I was ever at. - I mention that because for whatever reason, wherever these things occur, there is some sort of nuclear connection.
What that connection is at this point, we can only speculate, but we're trying to figure that out. - [Narrator] John Burroughs was a military policeman on one of America's most secret nuclear weapons bases in 1980 when he says he came into contact with a UFO in England's Rendlesham Forest. - [John] Whatever it was came right over the top of us.
I go "what the hell just happened? " He goes "I'm not really sure," but I got knocked to the ground. - [Narrator] Burroughs says after his encounter, he began experiencing serious health problems, and went to a hospital.
- I went in there and when the doctor saw me, he started doing the normal check-up. He put the stethoscope on my chest, he looked at me strange, he says, "what's the Air Force have to say about your heart murmur? " And I'm like, "heart murmur, I don't have a heart murmur.
" He goes "oh yes you do. " - [Narrator] Doctors have discovered life-threatening scarring on his heart. - There are people who are reporting when they come near, they come close to, or observe phenomena, that there are changes occurring.
- [Narrator] Burroughs says his injuries were just the beginning of his problems. - [Lou] Can I read that? - [John] Sure.
- [Narrator] In 2012, he filed a claim to get veteran's administration disability benefits, but he was shocked to find his military file had been classified as top secret. - So I went in to see the doctor. So I sit down and she starts asking me questions about what my claim is about.
So I answered two or three questions, and she says "hold on a second. " And I look at her and I said "what? " She goes "well there's an issue here.
" I go "what's the issue? " She says "well, you weren't in the Air Force "when you said this and that happened. " I go "what do you mean I wasn't in the Air Force?
" She says "according to our records, "you didn't enter the Air Force until 1982. " We have no medical records going back before '82. That's when the stonewalling started.
- [Narrator] Burroughs needed help, and he got it from an unlikely source. (mysterious music) (digital chirping) - We're going today to meet a former senior staffer for the late senator John McCain. - Well hello.
Pleasure to meet you. - Pleasure to meet you, how are you? - I am doing wonderful.
- [Narrator] Cheryl Bennet was able to use her skills navigating the military bureaucracy to get Burroughs his disability benefits. - Out of all of the veterans that I have worked with, and I have had at least 200 veterans that I worked for, never had a problem with getting any records. Getting information for John Burroughs was like pulling teeth, it was literally the most painful thing I have ever had to do.
- Do you think there was a concerted effort to say "okay, this file we do not want to share" or was it-- - Yes, yes. It was the higher-ups that were blocking John from getting his care. Department of Defense, the Department of Justice, they were all being very reluctant, but John's case was extraordinary because he had gone years trying to get help and nobody was there for him.
- Had you heard about the Rendlesham incident? - [Cheryl] Never. - Prior to him talking to you?
- Never. - And did he explain to you in general terms what that incident was about? - In great length.
I don't care what you're trying to cover up, this guy's life is on the line here. Why are you deceiving him? It happened and he has results with his heart and his eye to show it happened.
- Was this a purposeful effort to squelch John's record from being made public? - Oh, I would adamantly say yes, 100% it was deliberate. I mean, to this day, he still doesn't have his medical records and they won't give them to him.
- What do you think they're afraid of? - The incident that took place. They literally had proof and evidence, and they didn't want the world to know, which is kinda scary, because you don't know what else they're covering up or they don't want us to know.
- [Narrator] John Burroughs is one of only two US servicemen to receive military benefits after exposure to one of these unidentified objects. The other is the man who was with him in Rendlesham Forest that night, Sergeant Jim Penniston. If the US military really tried to cover up what happened in Rendlesham, was this part of a much larger pattern that went on for decades?
- I mean, there's a very checkered history of the Pentagon using the military as guinea pigs. It's not inconceivable that there is some secret test program of advanced aircraft that's using our active duty military folks basically as test subjects without telling them. - It's almost like the Kennedy assassination, there's so much evidence pointing at something, but nobody knows exactly what it is, but something really did happen, the people really were affected, there's no argument about that.
(tense music) (mysterious music) - [Narrator] Lou Elizando's investigation has uncovered new details of recent UFO encounters with nuclear-powered US Navy ships. But the connection between UFOs and America's nuclear assets stretches back decades. - There were employees at the test site assigned to monitor UFO activity in connection with the tests.
(bombs exploding) - [Narrator] Investigative journalist George Knapp has told Elizando that UFOs were seen near US nuclear tests dating back to the 1950s. (bomb explodes) - [George] All of the nuclear facilities, Los Alamos, Livermore, Sandia, Savannah River, all had UFO incidents. - I am here to discuss a so-called flying saucer.
- There's a news conference that was recorded on film after the UFO flap in 1952 two weekends in a row. UFOs are seen on radar, they're seen visually. - We have received and analyzed between one and 2,000 reports that have come to us from all kinds of sources.
We've been able to explain them as hoaxes, as erroneously identified friendly aircraft, as meteorological or electronic phenomena, or as light aberrations. - General Samford speaks to the media and says it was a weather inversion, now that's a lie. We know that there have been investigators that have been on the scene of some of these instances, where they've collected physical evidence and it's squirreled away.
- [Narrator] So what are these unidentified objects? One theory has persisted. The entire UFO phenomenon is in fact a US government disinformation campaign to draw attention away from its own next-generation weapons.
- In the past, the American government hasn't always been very forthcoming. There have been sins in the past that the American government has been guilty of committing against the American people. No wonder people don't trust the government.
- [Narrator] For decades, the military's counterintelligence divisions use the public's fascination with UFOs to disguise nuclear weapons research and top secret aircraft testing. RAF Bentwaters near Rendlesham Forest hid one of the US military's largest stockpiles of Cold War nuclear weapons, and some say what happened there in 1980 was merely a military test gone wrong. That same year at Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico, another series of strange events unfolded that raised even more questions about the government's role in the UFO story.
- 1980, Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico was still one of the centers of storing nuclear weapons and parts for nuclear weapons inside a big mountain that was hollowed out. - [Narrator] Greg Bishop is a UFO expert who wrote a book about the Kirtland case. - It was a place of secrets, it was a place of black projects, and the Air force would rather that people not figure out what was going on.
- [Narrator] As technology began to rapidly progress in the early 1980s, so did a new arms race with the Soviets to develop advanced weapons and aircraft. Kirtland was home to a massive nuclear weapons stockpile, but it was also one of America's most classified weapons testing facilities, where early versions of stealth jets and unmanned drones began to take shape. - A lot of the the military technology is at least 10 and sometimes 20 years ahead of public awareness.
They have to be, that's the way you keep ahead of the enemy. - [Narrator] One local man began documenting the strange lights flying above the base, and started recording the Air Force's radio communications. - He was listening to radio transmissions from the base.
Microbursts and communications having to do with defense programs. He calls up the Air Force and he says "do you know "you guys have these lights flying around the base? " They said "this is very interesting to us, "why don't you come down to the base and talk about it?
" - [Narrator] The Air Force assigned a counterintelligence operative named Richard Doty. - I began a dialogue trying to find out everything he had. We had to decide what we were going to do then, were we going to allow this to happen, or were we trying to convince him otherwise?
- [Narrator] Doty says he began telling the man what he was seeing was actually aliens and even gave him a computer loaded with what appeared to be messages from an alien race. - This computer starts spitting out the most insane stuff you could imagine. We are on a dying planet and we need your help and we want to exchange technology.
He got more and more paranoid, and Doty actually encouraged this paranoia. - We planted the seed that what he was seeing and what he was hearing and what he was collecting what in fact, probably, maybe UFOs. - [Narrator] But Richard Doty's covert mission wasn't just to confuse civilians about what was happening at Kirtland.
The operation was also intended to spread disinformation to Soviet spies looking to steal America's most advanced military technology. - The Air Force put out UFO stories to see if the Russians would start, you know, seeing chum in the water and show up at US military bases or in different places where they might be trying to spy on us. But it's a very difficult subject to get to the bottom of and have any real sense of where you are in this hall of mirrors.
- [Richard] There's probably about 80% of false information being presented, and about 20% of factual information. Unfortunately, the UFO community doesn't know which is which. - [Narrator] Many have questioned whether Lou Elizando is another Richard Doty, and his new UFO crusade is part of a larger disinformation campaign.
Before he ran the Pentagon's secret UFO unit, Elizando was assigned to protect highly classified military technology just like Doty. - Lou Elizando has a background in effectively government-sanctioned disinformation. That's what you do in the counterintelligence business, you spread lies for a purpose.
- Look, this is real, we know it's real, we need to look at it, we need to apply more attention, more resources into this. - [Narrator] Lou Elizando and his partner Chris Mellon insist they're not part of a UFO disinformation campaign. They're fighting for disclosure.
- It's actually against the law to conduct a covert action against our own people. - There's a difference between what um, has occurred on some occasions in the past, where individuals such as Richard Doty allegedly confuse or sow some disinformation, but we're in there trying to promote transparency, trying to get more information out. There's no pressure on the government to release any information until we came along.
Our combat pilots are encountering these things, it's confirmed by radar. It's not responsible to walk away from this. It's what 99% of the people in the department did, Lou was not one of those people.
(birds singing) (tense music) - Wow, this is a picture when I was a very young man. That's my dad. He's the one who told me anything worth loving is worth also dying for.
- [Narrator] After 20 years of serving his country as a military counterintelligence officer, Lou Elizando was still adjusting to life as a civilian. - It felt terrible. The point of sacrifice is not necessarily being a martyr, but it's being willing to give everything you have for the right reason, and that is so others may live in peace.
I've been a counterintelligence officer my entire career, since the day I went into the army. Counterintelligence and human operations, that's what I do. - People who say, "well, you know, you've been trained "to deceive," well, yeah, to some degree, deceive the enemy, you're not my enemy.
There was a time that the US government definitely applied its counterintelligence assets against the American people, but we've learned our lesson, and if I was ever asked to do those type of things, I wouldn't do it, period. (tense music) - [Narrator] Over the past year, Elizando has discovered what he sees as a disturbing pattern. UFOs have allegedly appeared above America's atomic test sites, Air Force bases stockpiled with nuclear weapons.
- [Man] The beams went down into the weapon storage area. I'm thinking is this a warning? - [Narrator] And nuclear powered aircraft carriers across the globe.
- We've got an object that just shows up at will, does what it wants, in a battle group on one of the most powerful warships in the world, and you actually get a manned fighter, two of them, there are eyewitnesses, and then nothing gets done. So what if they're ET or they want to hang out, then this is all good. You know, we're all gonna do a group hug and sing Kumbaya, but what if they're not?
- At the facilities where we were first designing and building nuclear weapons, there were UFOs. On the ships, the Nimitz, the Roosevelt, all the people working there have seen these things, are they all crazy? - Either mass delusion or they're all right, but either way, we need to look into this.
- Yeah. - [Narrator] Elizando is now more certain than ever that these unidentified craft pose a serious threat to national security, and there's a link between UFOs and US nuclear assets. - If it's a threat, it's a threat.
You're telling me you know it's a threat, and you're telling me to ignore it. You're telling me to turn my back to it, to pretend it's not there. - [Narrator] But the ultimate question remains how do you explain these seemingly unexplainable events?
-[Pilot] What the ---- is that thing? - It's rotating. - There's basically three possible explanations if you're just a rational, objective-minded person.
First, this is a foreign country that has made some sort of breakthrough, China, Russia, Israel. There's only a handful of countries that probably would have the capability potentially to do this. Second, it is a secret US government program.
These are advanced military aircraft, only a very few number of government officials and defense contractors know about. And that could explain why the government sort of doesn't want to talk about it, because they want to shield these secret military aircraft programs. The third possibility is the pilots reporting these have just lost their mind and they're hallucinating.
- [Narrator] Lou Elizando and his team believe none of these theories can explain the multitude of UFO encounters, but the US military they have investigated dating back seven decades. - We have to at least look at the damn data. Stop actively suppressing it and stop criticizing people who want to come out and have a conversation.
- [Narrator] And they can't discount another possibility, one few in the military establishment appear even willing to consider, that what we are dealing with is something else entirely. On the next Unidentified. - The distance between the Earth and the nearest other star is a few light years.
A spaceship could make this journey. We don't know of any reason why it's impossible. - [Tom] I would like to see what you have, that's what I'd like to see.
- I have. - [Luis] These are all their events, I got the whole thing here. - This may indeed be something that we are completely unprepared for.
It's chilling. - For decades, thousands of people experienced unidentified flying objects, and nothing has been done about these instances. - We need to confront the truth.
So Tom, this just hit the wire. This is a political article. The title is US Navy Drfting New Guidelines For Reporting UFOs.
This is the story of the millennium.
